Lut Desert

The Lut Desert was inscribed on the World Heritage List in 2016 and protects some 22,780 km² in south-eastern Iran, between the provinces of Kerman, Sistan and Baluchestan and South Khorasan. It was Iran's first natural property.

It is one of the hottest and most arid places on the planet. Satellite measurements have recorded surface temperatures above seventy degrees Celsius, the highest ever measured on Earth, and there are sectors where no precipitation has been documented for years on end and where life barely exists.

Its most spectacular geomorphological feature is the kaluts: a field of yardangs, parallel ridges sculpted by the north-westerly wind that blows steadily for months, up to eighty metres high and aligned over some one hundred and fifty kilometres. Seen from the air they resemble a ruined city, and indeed local tradition calls them just that. The property also includes one of the largest dune fields in the world, with star dunes exceeding four hundred metres, expanses of nebkhas, salt plains and surfaces of wind-polished pebbles. It is an exceptional laboratory for the study of aeolian processes.